Articles – Motwani Jadeja Institute for American Studies at 91��Ƶ

The US and China need an arms control pact — for AI

Rajiv Jayaram — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:28:47 +0000

By Asha Jadeja
Oct 19, 2026

The most dramatic global competition of our era isn’t simply the race between the United States and China to dominate artificial intelligence. It is the race to develop safeguards before AI capabilities outrun them.

The U.S. cannot and should not abandon the AI race. Nor should it allow China to set the rules for the world’s most important technology. But Washington and Beijing need to recognize that they face shared risks and vulnerabilities, and act accordingly. We have done this before — and it worked.

Rubio in Jamnagar, and the power of capital in diplomacy

Rajiv Jayaram — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 06:27:45 +0000

By C. Raja Mohan
Oct 21, 2026

The significance of US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit to the Reliance refinery in Jamnagar on Wednesday will extend beyond the familiar debate over India-US relations. Jamnagar offers a window into India’s complex energy politics that have shaped Delhi’s recent engagement with Washington, Moscow and Tehran.

Rubio’s interaction with the Tatas and Adanis in Mumbai and his talks with Mukesh Ambani in Jamnagar also highlight the growing connection between the Indian capital and the nation’s foreign policy. As Indian companies acquire greater economic weight and wider global reach, they are becoming an important part of India’s diplomatic arsenal, much like in other large nations.

The relationship between American business and foreign policy was captured in the adage: ‘what is good for General Motors is good for America’. General Motors no longer occupies the commanding position it once did, but the principle remains relevant. American finance and technology companies loom large in US foreign policy today.

The Other “G-2”: Trump, Putin and India

Rajiv Jayaram — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 06:05:28 +0000

By C. Raja Mohan

Few ideas cause greater anxiety in the Indian strategic community than a “G-2”. It invokes fears of a US-China partnership that might produce geopolitical duopoly over Asia. But Delhi should also reflect on another G-2—a strategic accommodation between America and Russia. India has fewer reasons to fear it, although it would bring complications of its own.

US President Donald Trump’s decision last week to ease sanctions on Russian diesel puts that possibility, distant though it might be, back in focus. After a telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump announced Russian supplies for American and global markets. Washington authorised diesel imports until April 2027. With diesel above six dollars a gallon and the question of inflation hovering over congressional elections on November 3, cheaper fuel for farmers and truckers is an urgent political priority for Trump.

At CSPOC 2024, a crucial question: Can parliaments restore faith in democracy?

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Mon, 19 Jan 2026 06:05:42 +0000

It is generally recognised by both knowledgeable experts and laymen alike that democracies today are traversing a difficult phase. The difficulty also arises from the fact that, at a time when the world’s problems are plentiful and appear daunting, global parliamentary cooperation among democracies could be better. It is against this backdrop that the Indian Parliament will get an opportunity to host the 28th Conference of Speakers and Presiding Officers of the Commonwealth (CSPOC) in New Delhi from January 14 to 16. India’s Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla will chair the meeting attended by representatives of 53 Commonwealth countries and 14 autonomous parliaments from different parts of the world. The international conference will be inaugurated by the Indian Prime Minister on January 15.

The conference is confined largely to members of the Commonwealth. But the issues related to Parliament that it is likely to debate have a certain relevance far beyond the Commonwealth. Issues likely to be taken up include the role of Speakers and Presiding Officers in maintaining strong democratic institutions; use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in parliaments; social media and its impact on Members of Parliament; and innovative strategies to enhance public understanding of parliament and citizens’ participation beyond voting.

America Must Salvage Its Relationship With India

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Mon, 19 Jan 2026 06:04:44 +0000

When Donald Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, U.S.-Indian relations were stronger than almost anyone in the twentieth century could have predicted. In the first 50 years after India gained independence in 1947, New Delhi was deeply suspicious of Washington, which it saw as an imperial power not unlike those in Europe. It repeatedly criticized the United States’ behavior and adopted a policy of nonalignment during the Cold War. But after the Soviet Union collapsed and the millennium turned, U.S. leaders realized that India could be an important partner in countering a rising China and a valuable

What the 2025 National Security Strategy Means for Asia

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 05:50:21 +0000

By Prof. (Dr.) C. Raja Mohan, Distinguished Professor, MJIAS

In Washington, every new administration arrives with its own ideological coalition and inevitably produces a document verbalizing its ideas of U.S. national security policy. The latest version of the (NSS), which was released by the Trump administration last week, is very much part of that tradition. More significant, however, is the way in which the document is a departure: If past strategy documents reflected minor variations on a broad post-World War II and post-Cold War foreign-policy consensus, this one marks a dramatic rupture from that consensus.

Ongoing reports and analysis

Whether the document is a reliable guide to U.S. President Donald Trump’s future actions is unclear. But it is undeniably an important milestone in the evolution of the domestic debate about the United States’ relationship with the world—one that captures the worldview of the MAGA movement and reflects the changing American mood. For Asia, the document offers a revealing window into how the second Trump administration understands the Indo-Pacific, treats U.S. alliances, assesses China, and imagines U.S. leadership in an era of geopolitical competition.

Trump’s National Security Strategy has evolved

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 05:44:34 +0000

By Ambassador (Dr.) Mohan Kumar, Director General, MJIAS

Now that the much awaited National Security Strategy (NSS) December 2025 is out, it is interesting to compare the present version with the NSS dated December 2017 which was published by the first Trump administration. A broad-brush assessment is given below. Analysts will no doubt pore over the 33-page document of the NSS 2025 ( the NSS 2017 was 68 pages long!) and give their detailed assessment in the days and weeks ahead.

America First: Both the NSS 2017 and the NSS 2025 put “America First” and this manifests itself through the core foreign policy interest which is protection of homeland security. The 2017 document is clear: The fundamental responsibility is to protect the American people, the homeland and the American way of life. The 2025 document goes one step further and talks of “full control over borders, over immigration system and over transportation networks through which people come into the country – ��𲵲��(emphasis mine) and illegally.” By clubbing legal and illegal immigration together, the NSS 2025 makes its intentions clear – to stop “destabilizing population flows” and allow the US full and sovereign control over who is admitted and who is not. The NSS 2025 proclaims that the era of mass migration is over and that a border controlled by the will of the American people as implemented by their government is fundamental to the survival of the US as a sovereign republic.

With Putin in Delhi, an opportunity: With old BFF Russia, go beyond defence

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Thu, 04 Dec 2025 06:56:49 +0000

By C Raja Mohan

The difficult negotiations over Ukraine open the door to a potential restructuring of relations among the US, Europe, and Russia. But Delhi must first correct the distortion in its Russia policy

President Vladimir Putin’s visit to India this week — his first in four years — comes in the midst of intensifying peace efforts in Ukraine. It offers Delhi an opportunity to reinvent the relationship with Russia that is much-valued but performs well below potential and is rather skewed.

Despite Delhi’s ritual celebration of Moscow as India’s “best friend forever”, the reality is less flattering. Indo-Russian ties have been reduced to a thin gruel over the years. Its narrow government-to-government interface has little traction among India’s new elites or its dynamic private sector. The Russian presence in Indian public life is a faint echo of the Soviet past. In Moscow too, India remains marginal to the Russian elites preoccupied with America, Europe, and China. If the relationship has endured, it is thanks largely to Putin’s personal commitment rather than a structural Russian interest.

Trump’s Ukraine peace plan is audacious. India has a stake in its success

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Thu, 27 Nov 2025 04:57:05 +0000

By C Raja Mohan

US President Donald Trump’s new peace plan for Ukraine offers a fresh look at what has long seemed an impossible proposition — a US-Russia partnership. Washington and Moscow have been at odds for nearly two decades, and many capitals have assumed the rivalry is permanent. Trump is challenging that assumption. He appears willing to take the relationship in a different direction.

His Ukraine peace plan contains ideas with sweeping implications — reintegrating Russia into the world economy, inviting Moscow back into the Western G7, and launching a broad US-Russia economic partnership. Trump’s 28-point peace formula for Ukraine mirrors key Russian demands — ceding eastern Ukraine and Crimea, keeping Kyiv out of NATO, and limiting its military.

Decoding the Alaska Summit

vkumar1@jgu.edu.in — Thu, 30 Oct 2025 15:46:17 +0000

By Dr Mohan Kumar

August 19th, 2025

As summits go, the one in Anchorage, Alaska between Presidents Trump and Putin was terribly significant from a geopolitical perspective. Still, it is important to recognize what the summit achieved and what it did not.

There is widespread consensus that the summit represented the “de-pariahfication” (I am making up this word) of Russia and its return to global centre stage as a great power. President Putin, against whom there is an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court (ICC), also comes in from the cold and almost instantaneously becomes persona grata. The more substantive gains for Russia are also obvious. One, there is no immediate cease fire agreement which would not have made sense for Russia which is still winning the war. Second and more important, there was agreement at least between the two leaders that the “root causes” of the Ukraine conflict must be dealt with. This has been a longstanding demand of President Putin. Third, to quote Putin: “All of Russia’s legitimate concerns must be taken into account, and a fair balance in the security sphere in Europe and the world as a whole must be restored”. India was one of the earliest countries to say at the UN that the “legitimate security interests” of Russia must be taken into account in any final settlement of the conflict in Ukraine. We were then persuaded to drop this expression in our statements at the UN due to Western pressure. It is a matter of ironical satisfaction that this has now been accepted by the US. Note that Putin also talks of “all Russia’s legitimate concerns” which will doubtless include removal of international sanctions against it and re-establishment of normal ties between Russia and the US. There is already talk of resumption of direct air travel and restoration of the strength of the diplomatic missions between Russia and the US.

The Alaska summit must be viewed as an incipient peace process than as a one-off meeting that produced concrete outcomes. For instance, this summit is reportedly to be followed by a one-on-one meeting between Presidents Putin and Zelensky (something the Kremlin is yet to agree to) eventually to be concluded with some kind of a framework peace agreement at a trilateral summit in the near future involving Trump, Putin and Zelensky. The Alaska summit did produce understandings but these are not final and may be reneged upon by the principals at any point in the future. Even so, President Trump stated that he and President Putin had agreed on many things except one or two big things which led him to declare tautologically that “there is no deal until there is a deal”! In the absence of a Joint Statement or written agreements, one can only speculate on the content of the Alaska summit meeting.

What could the two big things be that are outstanding? One might be the interpretation of what constitutes Russia’s security interests. The real fundamental Russian security interest relates to preventing Ukraine from joining NATO. So that would be non-negotiable from Putin’s perspective. Having secured that understanding, Putin did make a concession by saying that the security interests of Ukraine would also be taken into account. This could involve the limited presence of Western, non-NATO troops in Ukraine, which Putin may have agreeed to in principle. The EU and Ukraine would ideally want American troops to be part of this and wish to see an “Article 5-kind” of security guarantee. Following the Alaska Summit, alarmed European leaders (who were not part of the Alaska meeting) met with Trump along with Zelensky and issued a joint statement: We are clear that Ukraine must have ironclad security guarantees to effectively defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity, the leaders of Germany, France, Britain, Poland, Italy, Finland and the European Union institutions said in the statement and welcomed President Trump’s statement that the US is prepared to give security guarantees. It remains to be seen whether Russia can agree to this or will seek to dilute it. Reports attributed to Putin say that Russia has committed to not attacking or seizing terrritories from other countries on its border. This has been an obsession of the EU which firmly believes that Putin will attack the Baltic states before long and that his ultimate objective is the reconstruction of the erstwhile Soviet Empire.

The second big outstanding issue is the question related to territorial swap. This is arguably the most difficult to achieve for negotiators on both sides. Putin has let it be known that he wants the entire Donbas region for Russia. This means really Donetsk where Russia occupies 70 per cent of the territory. Luhansk is largely under Russian control anyway. In addition to this, Crimea too is non-negotiable for Russia. In return, Ukraine gets to maintain the fontlines in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, but little else. This will be tough for Zelensky and EU to swallow, but they may have little choice in the matter. The Ukrainian constitution itself may have to be amended for this purpose and Zelensky’s political future could be on the line.

One may ask what is in it for President Trump (and the US) in all of this. There is talk of Zelensky having agreed to buy American military hardware. The Limousine ride where only Trump and Putin were present may have some hidden deals, who knows. But more than anything else, Trump believes himself to be the ultimate “anti-war” President. His desire for the Nobel Peace Prize is an open secret. But if by some miracle he does bring the intractable conflict in Ukraine to a close, he will have strengthened his claim to that prize.

Ambassador Dr Mohan Kumar is Director General of the newly established Motwani Jadeja Institute for American Studies at OP Jindal 91��Ƶ University.